~ Freedom and Natural Law

Monthly Archives: May 2016

“Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” Jesus, Mark 12:17 (KJV). Much speculation has passed regarding what things are rightly Caesar’s; Jesus did not provide great specificity. He also did not speak much to the manner of rendering.

Decoration Day, or Memorial Day (as termed in the 20th Century), falls into the category of things rendered to Caesar – a day to remember those who died in martial government service. Says Facebook today:

Facebook, May 30, 2016.

Note, they say “gratitude for those who have served” not “those who served and died” as originally intended. They also promote pomp and jingoism (waving a BIG flag). This is the modern, statist interpretation of the Day – fireworks, speeches, cookouts, car sales. Today it is less about remembering the dead of war (war produces a lot of dead) but more about loud appreciation of government and government violence. If this is a secular, Caesar-rendering thing, then is this the proper manner for the rendering?

Jesus, again, provides insight, (indirectly) via his advice on prayer: “…thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men.” Matthew 6:5.

Today is a day to quietly remember the fallen and not to bombastically celebrate the government for which they fell. It might also serve as a good opportunity to consider the state’s quest to constantly add to the ranks of the fallen. Might we be better off with a memorial to war – meaning war as something dead and buried, gone – a grave to cover with flowers?

Simon Bolivar, the father of Venezuela, was a fan of Thomas Jefferson and both the American and the French revolutions. His belief was that South American countries would benefit from republican government so long as there was a firm hand in the government. Looking around his lands, he decried what he called the “triple yoke of ignorance, tyranny, and vice”. Over the past two centuries he’s been proven right and wrong about his creations.

Modern Venezuela is a fantastic country plagued with less-than-fantastic governance. The firm hand Bolivar thought necessary has proven a curse of late (from Hugo Chavez to Nicolas Maduro). The country has also slowly slid off the American model (a little more than America itself has) and into the abyss of socialism.

The United States has, thanks to the industriousness of her people, resisted the perils of statism longer and better than most. That is rapidly changing in the 21st century. Still, some think that America was made great because of various socialistic experiments rather than in spite of them. All of the popular contenders for President are pro-government. Two push traditional liberal/socialist policies and one of those two (Bernie) is a hardliner. Anyone thinking of supporting Bernie, specifically, or the government in general should take a close look at what is unfolding in Venezuela.

Electricity, water, phone access, police services and food are in short supply as a result of decades of mismanagement of the economy. (All socialist intervention is mismanagement.) The global financial crisis is helping to accelerate the vulnerable nation’s decline. A seeming side benefit of the crisis – curtailing of government services on a grand scale – is an illusion. Martial law is being formulated, being partly enacted via two recent state of emergency decrees from Maduro. Such places are prone to military coops. Venezuela will survive but not before the people there see a good deal of needless suffering.

American preppers are taking note as the scenario in Venezuela might as well have come from the warnings of a prepping website. Some are pointing and saying, “see, we told you so.” It could all happen to the U.S.

Others would do well to pay attention too. Most will not. The majority of America citizens are not aware of any wolf at the door until he comes through and pounces on the bed. Even then, most would only ask him not to block the TV. Many elites don’t or won’t care as they have helped create these conditions in the first place. Academics share a large responsibility. A huge share of that blame goes to law professors. American law schools, demographically, do not resemble America – at least not traditional (former) America. According to a Rasmussen Media study 82% of law school professors are Democrats and less than half are Christians.

Based on my experience, I’d say 82% is a little light. Substituting “leftist” for “Democrat” would steer the number closer to 99%. As of last year there were six professors in the entire nation who identified as libertarian, anarchist, or adherents of Natural Law – and one died in January. They are statistical outliers.

The 82% or 99% (or virtual 100%) preach never-ending statism. Government, they say, is the end-all, be-all super solution to any and all problems. Given the “triumph” of their adored system in Venezuela, I’d suggest most of them move there. I know they won’t as they also have a fondness for things like electricity, telephones, and food. To think, they shun paradise. Odd.

El Libertador. Google.

**Note: two names in this non-cigar piece are titanic in the cigar world. “Bernie” ain’t one.

The old blog is humming along nicely. This is post number 495 (I have D.C. surrounded, yes). I have a couple of books out now, several more shaping up, and a few score more in the hopper. I’m slower than Christmas but I’m getting there.

Here are a few things I have a mind to produce:

More books. More and better and certainly better sellers (you can help by generously maxing out your credit cards on Amazon;

With the paper copies I’m going to include e-books (like this) and maybe even books on tape (or MP3 or whatever sells these days);

More blog traffic via a constantly improving platform. Many changes to come;

Some sort of live-action forum. The Perrin Lovett Show is on life support over at Youtube. Hopefully this sleeper program will revive one day and gain a little more structure and professional design and consistency. I’m also thinking about web-radio of some sort;

Webinars. Webinars are the future and seem to make some money. We could have cigar webinars, gun webinars, political webinars, even a webinar about guns that shoot cigars at politicians. Heck, the sky is the limit;

and…

I always wanted to teach something. The limited experience I have came with terrific feedback. I’m looking into teaching via Udemy or Pdemy as I selfishly refer to it. Here are some courses you may (or most likely may NOT) see from me on Udemy:

Government oppression and crime is everywhere – taxes, bailouts, murder, theft, speed limits, regulations, etc. One doesn’t have to look for examples anymore as the state will bring the crap right to your door (sometimes through it, warrant or not). My dear cigar industry friends are in the middle of yet another example of government overreach.

The FDA is about to start lowering the premium cigar business into the grave. Diane Katz explains:

The premium cigar market is populated by limited-edition products and seasonal blends, and most of the small businesses that produce them don’t have the $1 million or more that the FDA estimates it will cost to comply with the regulations. At the same time, the agency concedes that the benefits of the new rules “are difficult to quantify” and it “cannot predict the size of these benefits.”

What is particularly nonsensical is that these artisan products are not the target of the FDA’s latest regulatory crackdown, which is actually aimed at combating teen smoking and the popularization of e-cigarettes (despite the fact that subjecting e-cigarettes to the new regulations will hurt public health far more than protect it).

Indeed, hand-rolled premium cigars are not mass-produced and sold in convenience stores, nor do they contain the flavor additives that attract young smokers these days. They also aren’t meant to be inhaled. According to industry representatives, the market share of premium cigars is a mere 2 percent of all cigars sold each year in the United States. The typical consumer — an adult male — smokes only two premium cigars a week.

Even the FDA concedes that people who smoke cigars exclusively have a lower risk for many smoking-related diseases compared with cigarette smokers, as documented in the 2014 Surgeon General’s Report.

The FDA did consider excluding premium cigars in its proposed regulation. But that option was dropped in the final rule — reportedly at the behest of cigarette manufacturers that would rather the government squelch competition.

One need not like cigars or even approve of tobacco use to recognize that the new regulations are misguided and excessive. That’s all too common now that America is transforming from a land of liberty into an administrative state. Were Julius Caeser Newton to land here today, he never could have built his business. Legislation is pending to exempt premium cigar makers from the FDA’s latest power grab. There is no excuse for Congress not to approve it.

Actually, Diane, there’s just no excuse for Congress. There’s no excuse for the FDA nor any justification for its existence.

Cigar lovers, think of the FDA as a giant City Hall. The old saying goes, “You can’t fight city hall.” The old saying is wrong. City hall has been fought and has been beaten before, destroyed in fact. Consider the plight of Marvin Heemeyer. Heemeyer was oppressed by local criminal officials in Granby, Colorado. They stole and stole and stole; Heemeyer was left with no recourse. The disaffected business owner said, “I was always willing to be reasonable until I had to be unreasonable … Sometimes reasonable men must do unreasonable things.”

Heemeyer tried the official route. He petitioned, he appealed, he campaigned – all to no avail. He suspected local officials and gangsters were in cahoots against him; subsequent investigations confirmed this suspicion.

Then Heemeyer got unreasonable (really he got REASONABLE, if you think about it). He fought city hall – with an armored bulldozer. He “won” his case by running over city hall, the police station, several other government buildings, and a corrupt local business. The police, even the S.W.A.T. team, was powerless to stop him. Knowing the National Guard was coming for him with heavy weapons he got reckless and thus met his end. Still he remains an American hero.

Heemeyer’s revenge. Wikipedia.

They don’t make a bulldozer big enough for the FDA’s enormous campus on New Hampshire Ave. Still, there must be some other reasonable actions we can consider in answer to the government’s unreasonable actions. If we choose to be unreasonable, to be unfree, we consent to live as serfs. I wonder if Heemeyer had a cigar in that tank?

Do not panic. That foul odor wafting through the air today was not the result of an explosion at a hog rendering plant. You did not smell a rat. Well, actually you did – a rat named Paul Ryan. The little Speaker who couldn’t finally got some traction with his first signature legislation in the House. He, under orders from Jacob Lew and the international monied powers, crafted a “bipartisan deal” to bail out..er..restructure Puerto Rico’s $70 Billion debts.

A bipartisan action is generally applauded as it is seen as cooperation between the Bloods and Crips of Congress. What it really means, most of the time, is that a royal screwing is coming.

The Commonwealth of Puerto Rico is an unincorporated U.S. Territory. The people there have been granted near statehood, with a governor, a general assembly and some other criminal offices. The locals have petitioned for full statehood. Oddly, the United Nations considers P.R. a separate and sovereign nation. Whatever one calls the Island, the voters there and their elected clowns are adults. They should act like adults. Make a debt, pay a debt. Or not. Just don’t expect someone else to pick up the tab. Speaker Ryan has other ideas.

Puerto Rico is not about to default on its debt payments, but is defaulting (has [past tense] defaulted) on them. All things being equal this would not concern me much. What got my attention in the Wall Street Journal’s article last night was the smug arrogance of the Empire’s chief henchman, Jack Lew. He’s the creep who is kicking Old Hickory off the Twenty. Well, he’s been chosen to make that suggestion to the Fed puppet-masters.

In a letter to Congress, Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew warned on Monday that a U.S. “taxpayer-funded bailout may become the only legislative course available” if the proposed restructuring legislation isn’t approved.

The island’s debt is held by mutual funds, hedge funds, bond insurers and individual investors, who were attracted in part by tax benefits and high yields. The default Monday casts serious doubt on the commonwealth’s ability to make other future payments, which “means that other defaults are very likely on other Puerto Rico credits,” said Paul Mansour…

-WSJ, May 2, 2016.

Well, of course. Let one government and its supporters screw up and the other government and all its supporters (willing or no) will foot the bill. It’s the only course available. Letting nature take its course is not an option – that would be bad for the hedge funds, banks, and insurance companies. They pay a lot of money for their (their, like the own it and it belongs to them) government. They have to get their money’s worth. The bulk of the people remain blissfully unaware.

You may be blissful about this garbage but you’re no longer unaware. The Hill and the WSJ have notified you and I’ve told you twice now.

A people and their crooked “leaders” make mistakes. It happens to the best of us. A default would be bad for P.R. but it wouldn’t be the end of the world. Things might actually get better – financial correction they call it. But then the big boys would lose on their investments and they NEVER lose. At least not while they have your taxes to loot.

Mike Thompson, Detroit Free Press

The local spendthrifts will keep on spending, the Wall Street cabal will remain neck-deep in caviar, and the GOP establishment claims a victory. Yes, those “conservatives” everyone loves (and their “liberal” friends like Nanny Nancy Pelosi) think robbing the people to pay satanic hucksters is a victory. By the way, the only real opposition to this scheme in Congress has come from “socialist” Bernie Sanders:

The Puerto Rico legislation still hasn’t been scheduled on the House floor. Bishop will mark up the bill in his committee on Wednesday, leaving the full chamber just one day to take it up before lawmakers leave town Thursday for the Memorial Day recess.

Some lawmakers want a quick vote on Puerto Rico this week. The longer it hangs out there, the thinking goes, the more time political foes will have to try to stir up opposition. On the left, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a Democratic presidential candidate, urged his Senate colleagues Monday to oppose the legislation, ripping the oversight board as “undemocratic” because it’s comprised of “unelected” appointees.

The Hill, May 24, 2016.

The bailout will happen; consider it a done deal. Really $2 Billion or the whole $70 Billion is but a barely noticeable drop in the fed’s ocean of economic woe. Things like this add up though. When the whole system comes crashing down don’t count on the banksters to be found let alone lend a hand. They’re gathering the last of the cash (yours and mine) and preparing to flee. However, come hell or high water, the politicians will be easier to find. They’ll still expect to be re-elected. Remember this story and all the others. Hold them accountable or rinse and repeat with similar results.

A theory no more: “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” – H.L. Mencken. This is now Mencken’s LAW of Democracy.

Austria sits geographically and politically near the center of Europe. Like other Western nations the Republik Österreich is awash in third world invasion, degeneracy, and political/cultural chaos. The Austrian people had a chance to reverse course and apparently decided to stay it instead. Pro-Austrian and anti-terrorism/invasion Presidential candidate Norbert Hofer lost very narrowly to a typical liberal bed-wetter. Given the way he lost I suspect ballot fraud. Nonetheless, the people have, democratically, spoken – stupidly.

Austrians chose to elect a man who says, “Anyone who loves Austria must be shit”. They chose that over a man who would defend them and their culture. And, unlike Americans, they had real choices. Getting it good and hard.

Americans too are suffering the simultaneous dismantling of their culture and rampant immigration/invasion. The dots on the map below represent immigrants flooding the U.S.; imagine instead they are inbound cruise missiles.

Criminal invasion in America is surging. The invaders seek welfare and terror targets. They try to run people over with automobiles. They bring tuberculosis. This, coupled with a crumbling economy, a corrupt government, trans-whatever insanity, bad music and open witchcraft, makes for a different country than some of us remember.

Norbert will be back in Austria; he and his peers will sweep Europe. It will take but a little time. Hopefully time will cure the U.S. too. Otherwise we will continue to get it good and hard.

I like cigars. I hate government. I really really hate when government interferes with cigars. As if the regulations, restrictions and taxes, taxes, and even more taxes aren’t enough, now the FDA is hell-bent on yet more dastardly regulation of the good leaf.

This issue has been on my radar for a while but it was brought back to my attention over the past few weeks via murmurs I hear in the shops I frequent. Then I saw this Facebook post/plea from my friend Patrick Vivalo:

Thank you Patrick (and re-post of Russell Wilder).

I think I signed the petition some time back. And I’m not really into petitions (or remembering them).

The FDA’s new rules would wreak havoc on the cigar business through some of the strangest, communist bullshit imaginable. “New” cigars, meaning those crafted since 2007, would have to be inspected and approved by Big Brother. Older, pre-2007 sticks would be exempt. The approval process (GAWD only knows how that will work) will be both time-consuming and onerously expensive – I’ve heard estimates in the hundreds of thousands per cigar type. And more and worse is to come.

WORLD EXCLUSIVE!!!!! I have the first ever photograph of a prototype FDA cigar inspector. Yes, this dude (or someone like him) will regulate our smokes:

U.S. FDA Office of Idiocy.

I could care less what the stated reasons for this unnecessary intrusion into my hobby are. I suspect the FDA wants to protect all of those children one is constantly tripping over at the local cigar shop – every bit as common as honest politicians and useful regulators!

Reading through the Constitution I found no authority for cigar regulation. I double checked, doubting my own senses. Still not there. In fact the word”cigar” does not appear even once in the text. Believe it or not, the FDA isn’t mentioned either. A reading of what is in there would lead one to think the government does not have legal authority to regulate cigars – or much of anything else. Odd, that. Not to worry; what the feds lack in legality, they make up for with threats and sheer violence. Tyranny, I think they call it.

Patrick and Russell and many others signed the petition. Russell even went to Washington (an act of supreme bravery and sacrifice) on a mission with other industry leaders to protest this meddlesome evil in Congress. I hate to say they failed … but here we are back at the petition again. (Two petitions – one for the criminals in Congress and one for the chief criminal in the Whitehouse.) I fear none of this will work.

A better, more comprehensive approach would be to get an honest member of Congress to initiate legislation to abolish the FDA entirely. Somehow humanity survived without it up until 1906. Given the departure of Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich, it might be just as worthwhile to consult the Wizard of Oz on this matter…

Petitions, Congress, the President, and the various apparati of the bureaucracy are all by-products of the Constitution which established this particular corrupt government in the first place. Like all systems, this one was destined to grow dangerously out of control. Working within the system to fix the system is insane and self-defeating. The Constitution created the government; government killed the Constitution; “let’s have the government follow the Constitution!” Get it? It’s kind of like trying to get to know the termites and reason with them so they won’t eat your house. That won’t work. Tents and gas work.

Thomas Jefferson said, “the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. It is it’s natural manure.” The tree is all but dead in Amerika despite the copious amounts of unnatural manure lying about D.C. At any rate, our “patriots” are now completely preoccupied with television, chasing fake money, sports, and other triviality. “Ain’t nobody got time for revolution!”

So we humbly petition our masters to mind their own business. These regulatory measures, very likely to come to pass, will not kill the business just yet. Life will go on. Children will be safe. Voodoo, busybody inspectors will be well paid.

You, the non-cigar reader, might pause to wonder why you should care about this issue. It doesn’t concern you directly. Yet, you rest assured the ever-benevolent forces of the state have some new regulatory scheme in mind for what does concern you. “First they came for the cigar lovers…”

It’s another of those rare glimmers of truth and hope from fed-land. The State of Texas sued the federal government over an immigration matter in the case of Texas v. United States, 1:14-cv-00254, (So. D. Texas, May 19, 2016). In the proceedings attorneys from the U.S. Department of Justice [SIC] lied repeatedly to both Texas and to the Court. This is standard operating procedure.

Judge Andrew S. Hanson isn’t having it. Yesterday he issued a scathing 28-page Order admonishing the U.S. for the misconduct, barring certain attorneys from the Court, and directing others to attend ethics classes. Here’s the entire Order.

Scribd.

This ruling is unlikely to change much of anything outside of this particular case. Anyone else would be in jail for a similar offense. Still, this is a ray of hope. Judge Hanson remains optimistic: “The Court cannot help but hope that the new Attorney General, being a former United States Attorney, would also believe strongly that it is the duty of DOJ attorneys to act honestly in all of their dealings with a court, with opposing counsel and with the American people.” Texas, Supra, at Slip 28.